Microorganisms produce various physiologically active substances, and a part of them has been utilized effectively for the improvement of productivity in the field of agriculture. For example, milbemycins, avermectins, and spinosyns have been put into practical use as insecticides, and blasticidin and kasugamycin as fungicides.
On the other hand, in the field of herbicides, bialaphos has been commercialized.
Metabolites of microorganisms, when used as agrochemicals, have an advantage of being easily degraded in the environment, and this advantage is deemed to be a desirable property which the future agrochemicals should have, in consideration of the environmental load. However, no compound has been put into practical use other than those set forth above as a compound having a herbicidal activity, and there have been demands for a novel active substance to be produced.